The story of the Congo Free State

by Henry Wellington Wack

“You have never produced a single iota of evidence in support of this statement against the Catholic missionaries, who are doing such splendid work in the Congo territory. We characterise the statement as a gross and palpable invention, but, in that respect, it has only been on a par with the general policy of yourself and the so-called ‘Congo Reform Society’ in connection with these matters. “It has also been asserted by the secretary of the Aborigines’ Protection Society—which has been mainly responsible, with yourself and the Liverpool shippers and merchants, for working up this campaign of calumny—that the clerical party in Belgium is supporting the King in his Congo policy, irrespective of any atrocities that may be committed, because the King has agreed to support them in Belgium. This is not only a libel on Belgian Catholics and the Belgian people—who have been insolently referred to by the Daily News as ‘barbarians’—but is amply disproved by the fact that the most recent exposure of your tactics, and the tactics of your society, has been made in the columns of the well-known anti-clerical paper, The Independance Belge, of Brussels, which has published the disclosures with reference to your bribing of a Congo official to secure evidence from him, and has amply exposed, on many occasions, the selfish and dishonest character of this anti-Congo campaign.

“You have printed the grossest inventions with reference to the treatment of British natives in Congo territory. You have said that at Lagos, and in the surrounding district, if the word ‘Congo’ is mentioned to a native he will make for the bush if he is on land, and will jump into the water if he happens to be on sea, in order to escape going to the Congo!

“A full and impartial inquiry made by a number of English gentlemen at Lagos, and the evidence of one hundred and seventy-five natives taken on oath, shows how baseless and unscrupulous is your statement. One English gentleman declares that ‘in a single week’s time he would undertake to send two thousand natives to the Congo, if the English Government would permit their enrolment’—the taxation being so much heavier in British territory than in Congo territory, that natives have to seek in the latter the means of earning the taxation which they are compelled to pay to the British administration.

“Missionaries of all classes, Catholic and non-Catholic, have borne ample testimony to the humane and civilising influence of the Congo administration. Englishmen like Lord Mountmorres, Major Harrison, of Hull, Mr. Grenfell, Mr. Bell, Mr. Holland, Mr. Maguire, as also Mrs. French-Sheldon, Mrs. Doering, and others, have borne the most emphatic testimony to the lies and misrepresentations that have been so sedulously spread by yourself and your friends with reference to the Congo administration.

“You cannot have failed to notice that in La Vérité sur le Congo for October-November, 1904, page 3, you are accused of actually having faked certain photographs which appeared in your book—one on page 49, in which certain natives are represented holding cut-off hands. The publication referred to says that ‘the hands seem to have been added afterwards’; and, with regard to a photograph on page 225 of your book, the same publication says that ‘the chains around the necks of the natives would also appear to have been designed on the plate.’

“You have put these photographs forward as real. Will you produce the negatives and the name of the person who took the actual photographs? Or will you remain content to rest under the charge of fabricating evidence of this description to deceive your readers?

“The Catholic Herald denounces, and will denounce, outrages upon natives and wrongdoing and maladministration of native territories, whether by Belgians or by any other people. No doubt wrongdoing has taken place; but is it of such a character as justifies people in this country taking up arms against those responsible for it?

“Is it not rather inseparable from the administration of native territories? Let any one responsible for native administration answer this question, but let not the good cause of fair play and justice for the natives be disgraced and besmirched by the recklessness and viciousness that have been displayed in connection with this Congo agitation.

“The Catholic Herald accepts in full all responsibility for the statements made herein, and for the publication of them, and for their circulation broadcast through the Press of this country, and believes that in doing so it is discharging a public duty, not only to the Catholic name, which you have foully libelled, but also to the cause of international peace and goodwill, which this anti-Congo campaign, based on selfish and sordid motives, has done so much to impair.

“The administration of the Congo will compare more than favourably with the administration of native territories under British rule. There is more consideration shown to the natives, more care evinced for their interests, and they are less heavily taxed, and more humanely treated in the Congo, than is the case in any British territory in Africa to-day.